Imprudence (39 page)

Rue continued pawing.

“How could you let Quesnel get hurt? He was only up there because he was worried about you. I told him not to bother.” Complaining the entire time, Aggie pulled off the protective cover and cracked the tank top.

Rue leapt inside.

The orange-tinged liquid was cold and weirdly slimy. She took a breath and lowered herself until she was totally submerged in the stuff, even the tips of her ears and tail. At which juncture, the liquid cut off her tether.

She turned back into a prissy human.

Rue reemerged, gasping for air. She'd gone from the painful agony of shift to the general discomfort of the numbing feel of liquid. She hoisted herself out, entirely naked except for the slime, and decided to simply be at peace with this. She was a metanatural after all. She was bound to be naked in front of her crew. The two sooties on duty carefully pretended not to look.

Aggie didn't care. “You've treated him shabby, poor lad. Taking advantage of his expertise and affection. Imagine boldly as to ask for an education of
that
kind!”

So Quesnel told Aggie that, did he? Well, to be fair, I told Primrose.
“Now who's prissy?” Rue wiped liquid from her eyes, nose, and mouth. She made a
put
-
put
-
put
sound, trying to blow the foul-tasting stuff off her lips.

Aggie almost stomped her foot she was that angry. “You owe him an apology!”

Rue said, “I happen to agree with you. Unfortunately, he was unconscious last I checked.”

“Try again!” A pause. “Wait. You agree with me?”

Rue rolled her eyes and marched towards the spiral stairs. “I didn't think he really cared for me.”

Aggie followed. “But he's been potty about you since the duck pond incident.”

Rue wrinkled her nose. “That's disgusting. I was eight!”

“The
second
duck pond incident, you idiot. Why else do you think he stayed aboard?”

“To see the world? To get away from his mothers?” Rue was flushed with annoyance but tried to keep an impassive demeanour. She was learning much from Aggie's diatribe.

Aggie scrunched up her face. “Well, yes, that, too, but
also
he's in love with you.”

Rue's thoughts whirled.
Is Aggie right?
Is it really more than a
lust
-
filled
whim?
She shied away from the word
love
. It was too bold, even in her own head. The very notion that Quesnel properly loved her was slippery with impossibility, like an oiled ferret. Could they really have that honest constant kind of love?
The kind that meant he might stay the whole night in her bed and wake up next to her? He hadn't acted like it so far.

“Oh for goodness' sake, don't you understand anything?” Aggie huffed, her tone modified in her own confusion at Rue's persistent unwillingness to rise to the bait.

By this point, Rue was halfway up the spiral staircase.

“Apparently not. Thank you, Miss Phinkerlington, for a most educational conversation. I may come down and have you yell at me again, next time I need my relationships explained to me.”

Aggie put her hands on her hips and glared up. “You do that.”

“Now, if you will excuse me, I should get back to the man in question.”

“You might want some clothing.”

“Yes, thank you, Miss Phinkerlington.”

Things were quiet on deck.

Rue, wearing a perfectly respectable brown paisley robe, hair loose but thick with orangeish goop, found the group around Quesnel busy planning to relocate him to his quarters.

Primrose was in charge. “I think we can improvise a litter. It's better to move him to an environment where we can keep him safe, out of the way, and clean. Oh, Rue! Thank goodness. Tasherit said she felt her tether snap. We worried you might be dead.”

“Thought Aggie killed you,” said a weak voice.

Rue was on her knees next to her chief engineer instantly. “You're awake.” She grabbed his left hand. “How are you feeling?” It was an utterly inane question to ask, but everything else she thought of was impolitic.

“Like I've been shot, strangely enough.”

“It's no joking matter. You just collapsed. It was horrible.” Rue felt the prickles around her eyes from that memory. She shook herself and went on. “Smart of you to choose the right kind. Apparently through-and-throughs heal best. We doused you in cognac as well.” Rue caressed his palm with her thumb.

“Percy's?”

“Yes.”

“Good. Still, it's a bloody waste.” Trust a Frenchman to lament lack of cognac.

“It is not! What better use? We're going to move you below now.” Rue let go of his hand.

The two footmen hoisted Quesnel up, trying to keep him as steady as possible. The ship was not made for this kind of transport, but they managed to get him down the main stairs and into the guest room previously occupied by Rue's parents. It was closer to engineering and easier to get to than his actual room.

By the time Quesnel was set on the bed, he'd turned an unbecoming yellow colour and was sweating heavily.

Fortunately, Anitra reported no additional blood loss had resulted.

Rue tried to be nice about it. “You're doing a wonderful job, Miss Panettone. Please don't take this amiss, but did you ask the other Drifters if they had a surgeon aboard?”

Anitra nodded. “I did indeed. I don't want this kind of responsibility. All I've got is limited herb lore and some training for the woman's balloon, when those times come.”

“Midwifery?” Rue reached for the outdated term.

“Something like. This is beyond my limited skills.”

“We will all do our best. Hopefully Percy has a book on bullet wounds.”

Quesnel gave a weak snort. “I doubt it. Books on badminton, possibly, but nothing more useful.”

Anitra finished checking on everything. “Are you comfortable?”

“Feeling rather spoiled. Two beautiful ladies tending to my every need.”

“He's flirting. He must be feeling better.” Rue smiled.

Anitra reached for a small bottle of clear liquid. “Laudanum, for the pain. It'll put you to sleep. Don't take it on your own – we want to keep track of how much.”

Quesnel wrinkled his nose. “No fretting there. I loathe the stuff. Makes me feel like I'm being smothered slowly by a flock of malevolent robins, red breasts first, all pushing in against the sides of my eyes.”

That was oddly specific. “When have you had laudanum?” Rue bustled about, making certain there was water next to his bed, and a book, and some biscuits.

“Believe it or not, in my childhood I was prone to explosions.”

“Liked to experiment, did you?” Rue smiled again, imagining a tiny Quesnel running around mixing noxious chemicals and destroying his mother's laboratory.

“Broke my right wrist once. Seems I have it in for the right side of my body.”

“Good thing, too,” said Anitra. “Left side this time and it'd be awfully close to your heart.”

Rue shuddered.

Anitra helped Quesnel take a nip from the laudanum bottle. He made a disgusted face.

“I can't think of anything else.” Anitra turned to go.

Rue nodded. “Send Virgil down, would you, please? Ask him to check in with Cook, eat something, and bring us tea. I'll stay with Mr Lefoux for the time being.”

Anitra agreed and left, leaving the door to Quesnel's room wide open. As if anyone still cared about Rue's reputation. As if Quesnel were capable of doing anything with the tattered remains of said reputation. Rue wished he could.

The Frenchman was looking strangely young. His blond hair was darkened by sweat, spiky against the pillow. “Rue,
chérie
, I have to tell you something.”

“It's not important.” Rue made herself sound reassuring. He seemed so worried. “I'll be nearby when you wake. Send Virgil and I'll come right away.”

Quesnel forced his eyes open. “No!” They were heavy-lidded with the poppy's fateful effects. “Robins are here.”

Rue drew up a chair and leaned close, wanting to touch him very badly but not wanting to cause any further pain.

“I left it too long, didn't I?” he whispered, slow and slurred.

“What?”

“Why didn't you ever ask me how I felt about you, Rue?”

“I'm frightened.”

He was trying to focus on her face through the robin feathers. “No one has ever accused you of lacking courage.”

So Rue screwed that courage to the sticking point. “Why did you do as Dama asked, about the preservation tank? You don't owe him any favours.”

“Perhaps I wanted to please the father of the woman I loved.”

Rue blinked. He said it first. The word was out there, hovering above them, like a tiny explosive dirigible. “Are you secretly traditional and” – she paused, unsure of the right word – “romantic?”

“Perhaps I am.”

“But you're so devil-may-care.” Rue's stomach went all wobbly.

“You thought that meant I hadn't a working heart underneath? Perhaps I hide the one with the other.” His voice was slurring. His eyes were closing again. “Perhaps I thought you were only curious.”

“Oh.” Rue was taken with this idea.

“Say it back, Rue. I might not wake up again, you realise?”

“Now who's being melodramatic?”

He smiled, eyes closed.

Rue leaned over and whispered, very quietly, into his ear, “Well fine, then. I love you, too.”

He was already asleep.

“Lovely,” said Rue into the resulting silence. “Now I have to go through this again.”

“
G
o through what again?” Primrose marched into the sickroom.

“Oh, nothing. He's sleeping.”

“That's good. Sleep heals.”

“Most sagacious, my dear.”

Primrose was holding a large reticule, stuffed to bursting, as well as a round pie tin, empty, and an embroidery hoop, full.

“Prim, you know Quesnel doesn't embroider?” Rue shifted a little away from the patient so Prim might bustle.

Bustle Prim did. “But I do and someone should sit with him.”

“I sent for Virgil.”

“Excellent, then we can take it in shifts.”

“You're too good sometimes, Primrose.”

“I know.”

“What's the pie tin for?”

Prim went very red. “His, um, tender essentials.”

Rue blinked and then, “Oh.”

Primrose puttered about extracting various additional necessities from the reticule – her embroidery kit, the diminished bottles of cognac and iodine, more bandages, and a jar of calf's foot jelly.

“And the jelly?”

“I don't know. But Mother was always sending round calf's foot jelly to invalids and I knew Cook had some, so I thought I might as well bring it along.”

“I'm impressed you stocked laudanum and bandages. Admirable foresight, my dear.”

Primrose glowed at the compliment. “We have as complete a medical cabinet as I could manage. I used Steel and Gardiner's recommended list for a family emigrating to India and multiplied the contents tenfold.” She stood back, contemplating her stack. “Now, have I forgotten anything?”

“If you have, send Virgil out for it when he gets here.” Rue stood, stretching. “Don't be surprised if Quensel wakes up talking of robins.”

Rue stayed, looking down at Quesnel while Prim settled in, organising things in that competent way of hers.

His face, without the twinkle and animation, was different, lost. And, of course, she'd never seen what he looked like sleeping.

“Primrose?”

“Yes, Rue?” Primrose put a comforting arm about Rue's waist and rested her head on her shoulder.

“Did I do wrong by him?”

“Did he say he loves you?”

“You knew?”

Primrose wore an expression that said, clear as if she spoke the words, that the entire ship knew.

“Oh.” Rue tugged on one hot ear, crestfallen.

“I believe there is a great deal of wagering on the subject. The decklings and sooties have a pool going. Did you say it back? I believe I'll be in for two crowns if you did.”

“Does it count if he was sleeping?”

Primrose frowned. “Excellent question.”

Rue sighed, letting everything go and bowing to the inevitable. “Why didn't you tell me he felt that way? I might have been nicer to him. Why didn't you tell me
I felt that way
, for that matter?”

“I tried. You didn't want to hear it.”

Some day
, thought Rue,
I'm going to be saying those words to you. I hope you don't bungle it as badly as I did.

Primrose looked smug. “Apparently it takes a bullet wound to bring you to your senses.”

Rue hung her head, ashamed.

“So, it's done now. You'll have to accept your fate, Rue.”

“Why must you be so logical all the time?”

“You know my mother and brother.” Primrose's voice held a wealth of familial responsibility.

“Ah.” Rue nodded her understanding and left the sickroom.

Perhaps there was a little more bounce in her step than there had been before. Why not just let herself be in love with Quesnel? Seemed silly now, to bother to fight it. Of course, he could still go and die on her and cock it all up. Rue chose to believe he would heal nicely. It was only his right side, after all. Rue knew from intimate experience that Quesnel was left-handed.

Quesnel didn't die.

They set up a rotation of personnel to tend him, with each visitor training the next in keeping his injury clean, changing the dressings, checking for infection, and allowing him the cheat at piquet.

Rue came in one evening to find Aggie, a fireman, a greaser, and two sooties all smoking and dicing with the invalid. The room was full of pipe smoke and laughter. Quesnel had a little colour in his cheeks. Rue had never seen Aggie cheerful before. She might even be called pretty. Although the moment she saw Rue, she scowled.

Rue shook her head and tutted at them for the smoke and the dice because she felt it her role to do so, and then left them to it.

The
Spotted Custard
was six days following the White Nile southwards ever further into uncharted territory. All the while Quesnel steadily improved. It would take him months to completely mend, and he wasn't out of danger until his wounds sealed over. Anitra worried he'd never regain full use of his right arm. Although by the fourth day he could squeeze Rue's fingers softly when she placed them in his right hand. They chose to be optimistic. Tasherit said that there might be a healer of some kind among her lost pride.

“Why would they have need?” Primrose asked.

“Oh, you think we do not have… what do you call them? Clavigers.”

“A pride lives alongside humans?” Primrose was fascinated.

“We call them our Chosen Ones.”

“You make it sound so noble. One step from being a drone.” Primrose had grown up in a vampire hive. She was odd about the whole food-source arrangement. She could recognise that werewolves were different, but it still made her twitchy.

Miss Sekhmet looked down her nose at them both in a regal manner. “It is an honour to be one with the Daughters of Sekhmet, to have the option of becoming a cat. Who would not want such a thing?”

Primrose answered, without pause, “Me! Why is it immortals always think everyone else wants to be immortal?”

Rue hadn't given the matter much thought, as by her very nature she would never have the option.

“Lady Primrose, you're an odd duck.” The werecat's tone was condescending.

“Not that odd!” Rue leapt to her friend's defence. “Countess Nadasdy had Mabel Dair, the famous actress, in her stable for years. She never asked for the bite. And there's Quesnel's mother, indentured to a hive and never considered metamorphosis even though there's a good chance she has extra soul. She's awfully creative.”

“And Quesnel, too, I'd say.” Primrose looked at the werecat with sudden intensity. “Would you have bitten him, if the bullet necessitated it?” Her dark eyes were fixed on the werelioness.

Tasherit dipped her head, embarrassed. “Don't be silly. I've no breeding bite. I'm female.”

That surprised the two girls.

Rue narrowed her eyes. “What do you mean? Female vampires are always makers. Female werewolves are always Alphas. It's much harder to survive a bite if you're a woman, but you're awfully powerful once you do. We assumed, you being female and immortal, that it was the same.” She looked to Prim for corroboration. Her friend nodded vigorously.

Tasherit gave them the kind of head wiggle that implied they were both insane. “
Lioness
, remember? Can go up high. Not as badly affected by aether. My kind is as different from werewolves in this as in other things. Prides are usually made up of one male lion and several lionesses, whether in natural or supernatural form.”

Rue and Primrose exchanged startled looks.

“You mean werecats are mostly
female
immortals?” Primrose was gobsmacked.

“And only
one
male maker?” Rue was slowly puzzling it out. “Like the opposite of a hive?”

The werecat inclined her head. “Exactly. Although, we, too, have a queen.”

“So male werecats are harder to metamorphose? And they need to be protected by the others because without him the pride would die out?”

“Yes, poor things. Of course, we need werelions to continue to exist, but the lads are useless without us.”

Primrose frowned. “How many of you are left? This pride we are going to find?”

Miss Sekhmet shrugged. “In my pride? A dozen or so last I checked. It's been a while. We aren't on good terms. If this weren't a serious matter of exposure, I would leave them be.”

“And how many males?”

“Just the one, Mios. Hopeless buffoon, but sweet. The ladies like him. Not really to my taste.”

Rue and Prim both struggled to button down their surprise. They'd never heard of such a thing. The Vanaras, surprising though it was to find a whole herd of shape-shifters that were basically large monkeys, had otherwise fit the general mould of werewolves. They were all male with an Alpha male leader. The idea that a pride of werecats might be mostly female was mind-altering.

An awkward silence descended.

“It sounds lovely,” said Primrose finally.

Rue, who'd been raised by large numbers of males on both sides of the family, couldn't even conceive of the idea. She supposed, in general, things would smell better.

They continued south, leaving the desert behind at last. The White Nile became the Sudd, a vast marshland bloated with splotches of floating papyrus islands.

The Drifter escort waved red hankies in discomfort. They were nomadic but never left the desert to float over such an alien landscape. Rue reminded them that they had a bargain, so they stayed, bobbing nervously.

“We will have stories to tell our grandchildren.” Anitra was riveted by the swamp, eyes wide in awe. “To see so much green in one lifetime.”

Eventually, the Sudd narrowed into a proper river again and on the morning of the eighth day, they floated over the small trading post of Gondokoro. Rue consulted Aggie, who was moderately civil, and said they were fine on fuel, having little used the propeller. Rue instructed Percy to press on.

The Blue Mountains appeared to their left, aptly named. The Nile below them pushed through dense jungle. The next day they passed over Lake Albert, after which the Nile turned white and perilous, full of waterfalls and rapids. Then, a full ten days on from their unpleasant stop at Khartoom, low on food rations and almost out of boiler water, they limped over Lake Victoria.